Hamilton understood the circumlocution. It was a direct order to report-at McFee’s convenience. McFee turned back to Monroe-Alpha, adding, “No trouble at all. Right on my way.”
Hamilton watched them leave together with vague discomfort.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Burn him down at once — ”
LONGCOURT PHYLLIS showed up for a moment in the waiting room of the development center and spoke to Hamilton. “Hello, Filthy.”
“H’lo, Phil.”
“Be with you in a moment. I’ve got to change.” She was dressed in complete coveralls, with helmet. An inhaler dangled loose about her neck.
“Okay.”
She returned promptly, dressed in more conventional and entirely feminine clothes. She was unarmed. He looked her over approvingly. “That’s better,” he said. “What was the masquerade?”
“Hmm? Oh, you mean the aseptic uniform. I’m on a new assignment-control naturals. You have to be terrifically careful in handling them. Poor little beggars!”
“Why?”
“You know why. They’re subject to infections. We don’t dare let them roll around in the dirt with the others. One little scratch, and anything can happen. We even have to sterilize their food.”
“Why bother? Why not let the weak ones die out?”
She looked annoyed. “I could answer that conventionally by saying that the control naturals are an invaluable reference plane for genetics-but I won’t. The real point is that they are human beings. They are just as precious to their parents as you were to yours, Filthy.”
“Sorry. I didn’t know my parents.”
She looked suddenly regretful. “Oh-Felix, I forgot!”
“No matter. I never could see,” he continued, “why you want to bury yourself in that cage of monkeys. It must be deadly.”
“Huh uh. Babies are fun. And they’re not much trouble. Feed ’em occasionally, help them when they need it, and love them a lot. That’s all there is to it.”
“I’ve always favored the bunghole theory myself.”
“The what?”
“You take the child at an early age and place it in a barrel. You feed it through the bunghole. At the age of seventeen, you drive in the bung.”
She grinned at him. “Filthy, for a nice man you have a nasty sense of humor. Seriously, your method leaves out the most essential part of a child’s rearing-the petting he gets from his nurses.”
“I don’t seem to recall much of it. I thought the basic idea was to take care of its physical needs and otherwise leave it strictly alone.”
“You’re way out of date. They used to have a notion of that sort, but it was silly-contra-biological.” It occurred to her that Hamilton’s faulty orientation might have its origin in the injudicious application of that outmoded, unfounded theory. The natural urges of mothers had prevented it ever being applied thoroughly in most cases, but his case was different. He had been what was, to her, the most tragic thing on earth-a baby that never left the development center. When she found one of these exceptions among her own charges she lavished on it extra affection and a little over. But she said nothing of this to him.
“Why,” she continued, “do you think animals lick their young?”
“To cleanse them, I suppose.”
“Nonsense! You can’t expect an animal to appreciate cleanliness. It’s a caress, an expression of instinctive affection. So-called instincts are instructive, Felix. They point to survival values.”
He shrugged. “We’re here.”
They entered the restaurant-a pay-restaurant-he had chosen, and went to a private room reserved for them. They started the meal in silence. His usual sardonic humor was dampened by the thing in the back of his mind. This business of the Survivors Club-he had entered into it light-heartedly, but now it was developing ominous overtones which worried him. He wished that Mordan-the government, rather — would act.
He had not gotten ahead as fast in the organization as he had hoped. They were anxious to use him, willing to accept, to demand, his money, but he still had not obtained a clear picture of the whole network. He still did not know who was senior to McFee Norbert, nor did he know the numbers of the whole organization.
Meantime, daily the tightrope became more difficult to walk.
He had been permitted to see one thing which tended to show that the organization was older and larger than he had guessed. McFee Norbert had escorted him personally, as one of the final lessons in his education in the New Order, to a place in the country, location carefully concealed from Hamilton, where he was permitted to see the results of clandestine experiments in genetics.